Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, it's a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that at some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?

It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's out of ice cream.

Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.

Thank you, Ian.

Ian Skelly there, a radio three presenter so perfect that we have to hope that at some distant point in the future,

he might be revived using DNA harvested from one of his own coffee cups.

And why stop at Ian?

Why not bring back Daphne Oxenford or Wallace Greenslade or the passenger pigeon, the E.O. Hippas or the Tyrannosaurus Rex?

A hundred million years ago, there were mosquitoes, just like today.

And just like today, they fed on the blood of animals, even dinosaurs.

Sometimes, after biting a dinosaur, the mosquito would land on the branch of a tree

and get stuffed in the sap.

After a long time, the tree sap would get hard and become fossilized, just like a dinosaur bone, preserving the mosquito inside.

This fossilized tree sample, which we call amber, waited for millions of years with the mosquito inside until Jurassic Park scientists came along.

Using sophisticated techniques, they extract the preserved blood from the mosquito and, bingo, Dino, DMA.

The science fiction of Jurassic Park resurrecting the dinosaurs from genetic material trapped in amber. The science fiction of Jurassic Park, resurrecting the dinosaurs from genetic material trapped in amber.

But is it within the power of science to reverse extinction?

The molecular paleontologist Beth Shapiro is here to tell us how to clone a mammoth,

and more importantly, to explain why anyone would want to.

We'll also be considering something else that might be headed the way of the dodo and the thylacine,

a liberal arts education.

The journalist and CNN host Farid Zakaria is here to save it from its detractors,

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